


In the Shadows and Grandeurs and Tumults

by Anonymous



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-10 10:59:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15947978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Finarfin intrudes on Elwing's solitude, but he finds he is not unwelcome.





	In the Shadows and Grandeurs and Tumults

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Burning_Nightingale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Between The Shores Of Our Souls](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1114222) by [Burning_Nightingale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/pseuds/Burning_Nightingale). 



> A remix of Burning_Nightingale's fic "Between The Shores Of Our Souls," written for Remix Revival 2018. The title is from the poem ["From the Shore"](http://carl-sandburg.com/from_the_shore.htm) by Carl Sandburg, which always makes me think of Elwing.

The sea was bright in the afternoon sunlight at Alqualondë, and as the waves rose and fell in gentle motions, the light glittered across them like threads of gold. Finarfin admired the sight, while listening with half an ear to his wife and her mother arguing in a friendly way over who might win the ship race that was soon to begin. He was seated in a place of honor for the festival with Eärwen, Olwë, and Olwë’s wife, under a canopy that kept the sun off their heads. A breeze from the sea gently stirred the white cloth above them.

Finarfin cast a glance across the crowd; with so many of the Noldor and Teleri gathered together, there was always a chance of buried tensions rising to the surface. But the laughter he heard was unforced, the conversation no louder than he expected and without a hostile edge to it. As he sat back in his chair, he realized that one person had slipped out of sight without his noticing. “I don’t see Elwing here,” he said to Olwë. “I was hoping to have the chance to speak with her.”

Olwë looked around. “She may have left,” he said. “She is not over-fond of crowds, and she often finds these affairs wearing. Lady Tanwanel was with her. I should send someone to see.” But before he could call over one of the attendants, Tanwanel herself was seen making her way towards them through the crowd. Her movements were purposeful but graceful; the loose ends of her knot of silver braids barely stirred as she walked.

Arrived at the dais, Tanwanel bowed to the two kings and two queens. “I’m sorry, my lord,” she said wearily to Olwë. “I couldn’t stop her.”

“She went home?”

Tanwanel nodded. “She has no notion of etiquette,” she bit out. “I’ve told her she should at least bid the king and queen farewell before leaving, but she won’t listen—”

“She need not stay if she is tired,” Olwë said tactfully.

Tanwanel pressed her lips together in irritation. “She says it matters to her, that we agree to send aid to Middle-earth. The sea-captains are assembled here, and lords and ladies of both the Teleri and the Noldor, but when I try to bring her to speak with the people whose ear she needs, she simply disappears. I promised Captain Alarcë that Lady Elwing would speak to her—you know she does not give her support easily, and she is not someone who can be moved by a bare recital of the facts. She will understand what is at stake if she hears the tale from Elwing herself. But now Elwing has left without a word.” She sighed deeply. “I’ll have to make some excuse for her.”

“Don’t press Elwing too hard, Tanwanel,” Olwë said gently. “She has suffered much loss. She is more than a net to catch fish with—even if the noble lords of two kindreds assembled here are very tempting fish.”

Tanwanel laughed ruefully. “You’re right, I suppose. Only I don’t understand her. I tried to arrange everything for her, but she slips away—like a fish indeed.”

Olwë shook his head. “Leave her be, Tanwanel,” he said firmly. “She has done her part already, in coming here. Whether she wishes to spend time in conversation with strangers at a festival, however influential they are, must be left to her.”

“Very well, my lord.” Tanwanel bowed and took her leave.

Olwë sighed. “I should send someone after Elwing, to make sure she isn’t upset.”

“Will you send me?” Finarfin asked on a sudden impulse.

Olwë raised an eyebrow. “I can hardly ask the King of the Noldor to run errands for me.”

“She is my kin as well. And I’ve been wanting to speak with her. Will your people be offended if I leave early?”

Olwë glanced around the assembly. “If you stay until the ship race is over, then no one will mind.”

“Will you stay or come, Eärwen?” Finarfin asked.

“If she is shy of company, let us not inflict too much of it on her at once. I too wish to meet this cousin of mine! But it can wait for another time. And if you go, I should stay. Be back by sundown,” Eärwen added with a glint of humor, “or I’ll go back to Tirion without you.”

Finarfin laughed. “I’ll return in good time then.” Not long afterwards, he was riding along the path that led to Elwing’s tower.

The tower was a beautiful construction, soaring upward in white stone. He could see the harmonious blending of styles in it, made by the combined efforts of Teleri and Noldor craftsmen and women. The renewed peace between their two peoples was still a fragile thing, achieved with painful slowness. But Elwing’s tower was a tangible sign that the effort was not hopeless.

There was a small stable at the foot of the tower. Finarfin left his horse in the care of the stable-master and approached the door of the tower to ring the bell. A young maidservant opened the door. She drew back a little, looking uncertain. “I have come to speak with Elwing,” he said with an encouraging smile. “Will you ask her if she will see me?” The girl gave a shy nod. She stepped back to let him inside, then scampered off before he could say anything more.

He was left to himself for some time. There must be a good many stairs, he thought wryly, glancing upward. He waited in patience, his hands clasped behind his back. Finarfin glanced around at what he could see of the room from his position, trying to form an impression of Elwing—though perhaps Eärendil had had a hand in furnishing it also.

Finarfin only had the story at second- or third-hand: loss and retreat, battle and desperate flight, a voyage through storm and whatever enchantments defended Valinor, and their plea before the Valar in the Ring of Doom. It was not easy even for one of the Eldar to stand beneath the combined weight of the Valar’s gaze. In the end, he thought, the choice the Valar had given them was not altogether kind. But he was the son of two peoples himself, and he had also come to think of his wife’s people as his own. Throughout his life, he had resisted being told to choose one or the other.

Elwing, when at last she appeared, was clearly surprised to see him. She looked wary, he thought, like a bird that might take flight at any moment. He smiled, hoping to reassure her. “I hope you don’t mind the intrusion. I know you are fond of your solitude.”

Elwing shook her head. “No, I think you timed your visit perfectly. Today my thoughts have seemed too loud for my own head.” She hesitated and then continued cautiously, “But to have come so quickly you must have left the festival early . . . ”

It did not surprise him, that she had noticed. He made polite demurrals, and let her settle him inside, the two of them on a pair of comfortable chairs. It seemed she would even have invited him to stay the night as her guest, but he shook his head and told her he must be back by sunset.

“A flying visit, then,” she said. He thought she seemed disappointed.

She was not entirely averse to company, then, this stranger kinswoman of his. He was glad to consider her family, and so he told her, though he could not claim to know her yet. “You, I think, I am still puzzling out.”

“I should call for tea, then,” she said, smiling. “That always seems a good way to tease out people’s secrets.”

He smiled in return. “I think that would be most agreeable.”

The same shy servant girl brought them a pot of tea and two cups and then vanished again. Elwing poured the tea; Finarfin accepted his with a nod of thanks.

He held the teacup in his hands, breathing in the steam. It had a light, pleasant scent. “The approach to your tower is a beautiful view,” he said. “I think you were right not to want the scenery disturbed by a road.”

Elwing gave a quick nod. “I preferred the shore left as it was, with some wildness to it. And it disturbs the birds less.”

“There is something to be said for leaving things undisturbed,” Finarfin said meditatively. “The Noldorin way, I think, is to change and transform, to shatter and remake and search into things. It can lead to great insight and increase of knowledge, or to great beauty. But there is also beauty in choosing to leave things as they are, rather than take them apart.”

Elwing gripped her teacup tightly between her fingers. “I have seen enough of taking things apart,” she said with a hint of bitterness.

“And yet, some of the Noldor from Tirion and some of King Olwë’s people were able to work together on your tower, to create beauty together. The past is not forgotten,” he said slowly. “But old wounds can be healed, with time.”

Elwing took a sip of her tea, her expression neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

“When I was younger, when Tirion became too full of conflict, I often came here. Alqualondë was a refuge and a place of peace for me. I hope it can be so for you as well.”

Elwing made an ambivalent motion of her head. “King Olwë has been very generous, and his people have welcomed me. But so many of them seem to want something from me.”

“You are something of a hero to them,” Finarfin said gently. “They take inspiration from you. And when we return to Middle-earth, as I think now we will—”

Elwing shook her head. “I don’t want to know about it,” she said abruptly. At his look of surprise, she continued, “I don’t want to know anything about the preparations for the war, until they’re complete. I don’t want to think about it at all. Or else I’ll start thinking about—all the people I couldn’t save. And the ones we left behind, not knowing if they’re alive or dead.”

“My apologies, Elwing,” Finarfin said after a moment. “I did not mean to bring back dark memories.”

Elwing’s face was determined. “We came here, through the storms and the shadows. Even with the Silmaril, we barely passed through. We were able to ask the Valar for help. And they had to consider our fate and the fate of Middle-earth, and we waited and waited. And finally they said what would become of us, and they said they would help.”

She took a deep breath. “I won’t go asking for help again and again. The Valar have said that I am forbidden to return. Perhaps I had thoughts of coming back in triumph with an army to save everyone. But we, Eärendil and I, we won’t be the ones who go back. We won’t know whether our friends we left behind there are still alive, until someone comes back and tells us.”

“I understand,” Finarfin said, though it seemed too little. He wished to give her comfort, but he could only offer his honesty, matching her truth for truth. “My daughter is there, across the Sea. My brother—both my brothers—and my sons are gone. There are too many I love, whose fate I still do not know. But even if none sharing my blood were left alive in Middle-earth, if I could save even one person, I would consider it worth the journey.”

Elwing gave a jerky nod. “Tell me, when things are ready,” she said. “When the supplies are gathered and the soldiers are trained, when the spears and armor are readied in the forges. Then I will go to Olwë and his sea-captains, and ask them for aid. But I cannot gossip at parties. I cannot win over the Eldar one by one, wearing away at their doubts and fears. They have kin there also, on the other side of the Sea. If they go, let it be of their own will and desire, because they too think the venture worthwhile.”

Finarfin took a sip of his tea, letting them both regain their composure. After a moment, he said, “Elwing, would you tell me something of Middle-earth?” Her expression grew wary. “I don’t mean matters of politics or military advantage—I will not speak of those things now. But I have never walked in those lands, and I would know what it is like. I would gladly hear about any thing, any place that caught your fancy.” And he did wish to know of it: that land where his father awoke by Cuiviénen, where his daughter still lived, where his sons had fought and died.

After a moment, Elwing slowly nodded and began to speak. She had lived in a place called the Havens of Sirion, she and Eärendil, when he was not on a voyage. Finarfin would not have pried deeper, but he saw the images on the surface of her mind like reflections in water: a town growing haphazardly by the Sea, white-walled houses with clay-tiled roofs; a mighty river rushing along in foam, roaring, to empty itself in the Sea; a windswept rocky height, from which Elwing could gaze out to sea, hoping always for the sail of Eärendil’s ship, familiar and dear—And then there was his daughter, a brief glimpse only. She seemed much older than when he had last seen her; she had known sorrow, grown in wisdom and confidence. Seen through Elwing’s memories, her gaze was piercing, but not unkind. She carried herself like a queen. He caught his breath and almost reached out his hand, then, as if to catch the image and haul it back. He stopped himself with an effort. It was for Elwing to speak, or not.  He drank his tea and let Elwing speak, let himself listen.

“Perhaps you could tell me of Tirion,” Elwing said, when her reminiscences drifted to a halt. He could tell that she truly wanted to know. She refilled their cups again.

Finarfin kept the conversation to lighter matters; he spoke a little of his wife and her family, his mother and his sister Findis; an amusing dispute in his court that he was able to settle; a new painting that Eärwen wanted to commission for their house. He let her see the images in his mind: the graceful height of the Mindon Eldaliéva, the gardens of the king’s house, the workshops and forges where the Noldor busied themselves with their crafts. He spoke not only of Tirion, but of Alqualondë as he knew it, and Valmar with its golden bells. Elwing listened intently. He could tell she was becoming more at ease with him, and it pleased him.

Finarfin took his leave when the sky was beginning to darken. Elwing tried to keep him longer—“The sunset is beautiful from the top of the tower,” she assured him—but it would not do to keep Eärwen waiting. He rose, and thanked her for her hospitality. With a smile, he said, “I hope whatever secrets I shared with you were interesting enough to serve as payment.”

“They were more than interesting enough,” Elwing said with a slight laugh, rising also. “Next time you must stay long enough to watch the sun set. And perhaps bring your wife as well.”

“She would be honored, I am sure.” Eärwen would be glad to hear of it. Finarfin hoped to draw Elwing within the circle of their family; not tightly enough to trap her, but she should know she was not alone.

“It was wonderful to spend the afternoon with you, Elwing,” Finarfin said as he remounted his horse. She returned the compliment, and he thought she truly meant it.

As he rode away from the tower, Finarfin felt more hopeful than when he had arrived. Though Elwing knew anger and bitterness, her experiences had not poisoned her. However great Morgoth’s power, Middle-earth was not entirely dark, and he felt less fear now of what he would find. He glanced back over his shoulder and saw Elwing wave to him. He smiled, though he was too far away for her to see, and turned his horse’s head toward Alqualondë.


End file.
